Hey friends,

We’re back with the 9th edition of the Driver's Seat!

📍 Today’s Topics

1. Our First AI-Palooza 🤖

2. The Future of Biotech in Chicago 🧬

3. Chart of the Week 📊

4. The History of Digital Health in Chicago 🏥

5. Events Around the City 🗺

Have feedback? Just hit reply — I’d love to hear from you.

Let’s dive in! 🚙

🤖 Our First AI-Palooza

Last week, we held Chicago’s first AI-Palooza at the Drive Chicago office!

The room was full of AI founders, builders, and investors, all united in our shared vision to make Chicago an AI hub.

We had engaging seminars and discussions, where we spoke on topics like the AI creator economy / how to harness and leverage the latest advancements in LLMs and AI.

The rapid growth of AI is proof that we’re all trying to find our place within this craziness.

In the midst of the craziness and excitement, it becomes increasingly clear how important community building is.

When we prioritize community building, we can set out to establish a space where individuals come together, learn from each other, and form meaningful connections.

Community building creates genuine serendipity, which creates unexpected opportunities and transformative outcomes.

My biggest takeaways for the event:

We have the AI talent

• Top talent is crucial to create density / our universities are investing heavily into student success.

• UIUC was ranked the top-ranked institution for AI research in 2020.

• IIT created the Argonne National AI Laboratory, which focuses on research in natural language processing and computer vision.

We have the customers

• Enterprises are investing billions of dollars into LLMs and AI.

• Many of these companies are in the Midwest region.

We have the diversity

• Diversity is crucial in AI.

• Our city's diverse founders can and will develop AI solutions that address the needs of diverse communities.

Our first AI-Palooza will definitely not be our last.

We’ll continue to host gatherings at the Drive Chicago office that help attendees explore ways to leverage new technologies and discover ways that we can work together to build the future of Chicago.

I want the Driver’s Seat to be your best way to find out what’s going on in the city!

🧬 The Future of Biotech in Chicago

Last week, I had a chance to celebrate the arrival of the Chan Zuckerberg Biohub Initiative in Chicago.

This initiative represents a significant $250M investment in Chicago to develop our new biotech hub, which will focus on nano centers / disease prevention, leveraging new technologies to measure human biology.

This came together through the collaboration between three of our major universities: Northwestern University, the University of Chicago, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Select leaders from each university went out of their way to meet up every Saturday at 8am for a year to sketch together the vision and proposal for this hub. (True innovation comes from IRL collaboration)

It's worth noting that 60 proposals were received from other cities, and Chicago won!

When reflecting on what made this possible, it was our universities' strong emphasis on recruiting exceptional faculty that played a crucial role in this win for our city.

And our city's strengths in bioelectronics / engineering place it at the forefront of this field.

The Chan Zuckerberg initiative has set an ambitious mandate to cure all human diseases by the end of the century.

Our hub will function as a standalone research institute with its own faculty that will have about 50 employees. This is also a 10-year plan.

I’m so excited for this and want to give another congratulations to the universities that spearheaded this win for Chicago.

📊 Chart of the Week

This week’s chart is on the top US destinations for VC investment.

Great to see that Chicago made the list at number 5.

We saw 79 venture deals in Q1’23 and $9.3B of investment over the 12 month period that this data was collected.

Even though you’ll still note a major gap between the number one spot on the list and the others, it’s important to recognize that the Bay’s share has decreased from over 40% in 2018 and 2019 to 29.9% in the 12 months ending in March 2023.

Meanwhile, the combined share of the next four leading venture investment destinations has remained relatively steady, and the rest of the US has seen an increase in its share from 29.9% in 2019 to 38.6% in March.

This decline in Silicon Valley's share presents an opportunity for other ecosystems to attract investment.

🏥 The History of Digital Health in Chicago

The history of digital health startups / companies in Chicago showcases our city's commitment to advancing healthcare through technology.

Over the years, Chicago has become a thriving hub for digital health founders / we’ve witnessed the emergence of numerous pioneering companies in the field.

One of the notable milestones in Chicago's digital health history was the founding of Allscripts in 1986.

Allscripts quickly grew into a leading provider of electronic health record systems, establishing itself as a major player in the digital health space.

Allscripts' success paved the way for other digital health startups to emerge in the city.

HealthJoy and Tempus are two companies that revolutionized how we use AI in healthcare.

Chicago's entrepreneurial community also received a significant boost with the establishment of various incubators, accelerators, and venture capital firms dedicated to supporting digital health startups.

Organizations like MATTER and Healthbox provide resources, mentorship, and funding opportunities to fuel the growth of innovative healthcare startups in the city.

As the digital health landscape evolves, Chicago witnessed the rise of notable companies that made significant contributions in areas such as chronic disease management, personalized medicine, patient engagement, and workplace wellness.

Chicago remains at the forefront of leveraging technology to revolutionize healthcare and improve patient outcomes.

🗺 Events Around the City

Healthcare Meetup

• Hosted by Techstars

• Tuesday May 16

• RSVP

Chicago Venture Fellows Pitch Night

• Hosted by Chicago Blend

• Wednesday May 17

• RSVP

Private Investor Cocktails

• Hosted by LvlUp Ventures

• Thursday May 18

• RSVP

Software People Happy Hour

• Hosted by [Re]Launch

• Thursday May 18

• RSVP

Reply directly to this email if you have a tech event you want featured in the Driver’s Seat!

👋 See you next time!

Thanks for making it this far! 😎

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